A Place to Stand

Comments from Scotland on politics, technology & all related matters (ie everything)/"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."Henry Louis Mencken....WARNING - THE LIBERAL DEMOCRATS HAVE DECIDED THAT THIS BLOG IS LIKELY TO BE MISTAKEN FOR AN OFFICIAL PARTY SITE (no really, unanimous decision) I PROMISE IT ISN'T SO ENTER FREELY & OF YOUR OWN WILL

I think that the jury system is even more important to our freedom than a democratic Parliament. A jury can, if they so desire, ignore the law to produce a verdict which is just & which the government don't want. The Clive Pontin case being an example. This is almost the only pressure on government to make the law sensible.

Our Parliament has been thoroughly discredited by the payments scandal but there is no real agreement on what can or should be done short of stringing everybody up. Without such agreement & action credit will not be restored. Even the MPs now not only recognise how unpopular they are & are demoralised by it. I do not think call by MPs to trust their reforming zeal will be credible. Nor will some sort of commission of the "great & good"/usual suspects. Since Lord Hutton's greywash report on the Iraq war even High Court judges are not trusted (nor should they be - example Lords Bonomy & May's corrupt & probably murderous behaviour during the Milosvic "trial"). The only thing the people can trust is the people. Set up a number of citizen juries, selected openly at random from the electoral rolls as juries normally are, let them see all the options & deliver verdicts on what reforms are needed. I doubt if i would agree with everything they decided but would have a lot more respect for those decisions than anybody else I can think of.

(I rather approve of them all except the 2nd chamber which I would replace with constitutional limitations & a supreme court. So long as we don't have PR we can't really call Britain a democracy)

When citizen juries were used in examining the case for more nuclear they did not come out ecstatic for it but were sufficiently supportive that the eco-crowd started girning. Jury's are bound to come out with better informed opinions on whatever they are asked to study than the populace as a whole precisely because they do study them & so their results will be both wiser & more representative than any opinion poll.--------------A word in favour of fiddling MPs:

This is not a new scandal & not the worst one we could face. Many countries (& the EU) have far worse. Everybody who followed politics has known for years that MPs have been encouraged to fiddle their expenses because those in power were scared of the publicity of raising their pay. If we are going to be honest we also know we would have done the same given the same green light. The amounts don't even rate as trivial compared to the costs of government. What I think has happened is that we have a perfect storm of contempt for our leaders with a whole range of causes which has focused itself on this issue. The causes include the fact that we are in a recession; that it is a recession caused by politics; that neither of the other 2 party leaders appear to be much more than tailor's dummies; that the "great & good" have been discredited by things like the Hutton enquiry & the massive salaries of quamgists; war crimes & being lied to to bring them about; the feeling of powerlessness under the EU; Labour & Lib Dems breaking their most solemn promise on a referendum & even Cameron looking like he would rather weasel; a lack of national goals, anything much to be proud of in the running of the country or much of a future; that we all feel we are constantly lied to & treated like children by not just politicians but the media; even the dishonest attacks on bankers & Sir Fred, done to divert anger from the government, has rebounded on them; & perhaps most importantly because people simply cannot be isolated & lied to because we now have the net (I would put the uncovering of Labour's campaign of lies & a feeling the Tories would have done the same as part of this as an effect of being able to communicate through the net); and very clever management of this by the Telegraph in both trailing the story in advance & doling it out day by day.

If anybody thinks this is just going to go away if the more dodgy MPs are dropped & everybody else just hangs on they are wrong. Except, theoretically, for the recession ending, all the other factors remain in place. When conditions exist for a storm there will be a storm though exactly where & when it strikes cannot be told. There are also other, in my opinion sometimes worse, scandals which could equally set alight - the millions Blair is making & Mark Thatcher made; councillor's expenses; the money quangoists get & the way such jobs are doled out; sexual relations between MPs & Parliamentary assistants of all sexes; the alleged 2 ministers & on a statistical basis half dozen MP's whose names went unmentioned in Operation Orr; cocaine use in parliament; even what booze cost in MPs & journalist's bars; worst in my opinion but possibly few other's the complicity of most MPs in racial genocide, child sex slavery & dissections of living people following the criminal Kosovo war.

Machiavelli said no government can survive being held in both Contempt and Hatred & if they want to stop things getting worse I suggest Parliament throws itself on the mercy of the "court of public opinion" who, when treated honestly & fairly will do the same.

Friday, May 22, 2009

THE SCOTTISH Environment Protection Agency has defended the need for radiation testing at Dalgety Bay beach, following claims the contamination found there could be natural.

Monitoring has been carried out on the foreshore for several years and it is widely accepted the heightened radium levels come from the remains of aircraft dials burnt and emptied out after the war.

However, pro-nuclear campaigner Neil Craig (55) believes the paint blamed for the problem is water-soluble and would have dissolved over time.

He said, “SEPA are still maintaining this claim to have tested such sub-microscopic particles and proven them to be paint containing radium.

“It seems like kicking an argument when it is down to mention that the original radium paint was water- soluble, so that even if a fraction of a gram had been there 64 years ago it would be long gone, Scotland not having a desert climate.

“In any case, the fact is that the level of radiation is so much lower than background radiation elsewhere in Scotland.

“Yet SEPA are allowed to spend probable millions on such pointless nonsense.

“This is indicative of the way false fears have been used, worldwide, for bureaucratic eco-empire building.”

Radium-based luminescent paint was typically made by mixing a radium salt, zinc sulphide and a carrier material such as varnish or lacquer.

SEPA claim test results and circumstantial evidence point to the radiation being man-made and the solubility of the paint could have been altered during burning.

A spokesperson said, “The radionuclide analysis of particles at Dalgety Bay showed that they contained radium and its associated daughters.

“The lack of high concentrations of the higher members of the uranium-238 series is consistent with the radium being of man made origin.

“It is possible that the action of burning of luminised dials can produce a diverse range of chemical forms, each of which has a differing potential for absorption and uptake by man.

“This change and resultant variability in the chemical composition caused by burning also affects the solubility, and this could be a reason why the residues of the radium are still being detected after all this time.”

Over the years many items have been recovered from the beach, including dials and a vial of active material.

"Small particles or flakes found there are similar to those described by a former employee who worked where the instruments were made.

In March the MoD submitted its action plan to the SEPA after a survey found the radiation could provide a dose higher than safe limits.

It was agreed to have additional monitoring and clearer warning signs.

Plans to cover part of the beach with a protective membrane were submitted to Fife Council by the Defence Estates department this week.

The blanket will be used for a programme of identification and removal, to establish where particles are coming from."

From yesterday's courier. Courier is here though you would have to use the search facility to find the article.

I mentioned a few days ago that I had been phoned up by their reporter. I am pleased with this article in the middle of page 9. They have given a fair shake to both sides & I think my side comes off ahead but not on a knockout. However SEPA have made a serious admission which perhaps makes a knockout possible & i am sending a letter for publication in the Courier on that (they are obviously entitled to 1st publication).

Rather pleased to be called a pro-nuclear campaigner a term which appears to have been used online only 7 other times. "Anti-nuclear campaigner" having been used 4,860 times. It strikes me that it is much easier to be an anti campaigner than a pro one but that the latter is, by definition, more constructive.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Joe Biden has been accused on various pro-Serb blogs of making openly racist remarks worthy of the late Adolf Hitler. Neil Clark got a bit of stick from anti-Serbs for mentioning this without having an indisputable link & got some useful comments.

I don't think anybody can seriously deny that the sort of obscene scum who said that is an out & out Nazi unfit to hold any office whatsoever in the government of any nation with any pretensions to decency, or to serve under any President who is not himself either a racist Nazi or a corrupt whore.

Therefore CNN do have it & are censoring it, possibly for Larry King's benefit as much as Biden's. Nonetheless it clearly exists & equally clear that it is being deliberately censored, in a 1984 style by a corrupt MSM Yet again we see how easy it still is for the MSM to lie & censor to promote the most obscene crimes. The fact that the American & indeed world media could so completely & deliberately censor any mention of proof that Biden is a Nazi throughout the US election should worry anybody who wants to live in a democracy.I have sent this to CNN

Dear CNN,

Can you please confirm whether there is any reason CNN might wish not to make available an interview with then Senator Joe Biden on 1st August 1993 on Larry King in which he expressed his support for the racial genocide of 10 million human beings in that "all Serbs should be put in Nazi-style concentration camps". If there is no objection in principle, considering Biden's present job, I think you would agree that his commitment to Nazism is a matter of legitimate public interest & an interesting news story.

& also suggest the Serbian democratic opposition try to put this on YouTube as well.

I will, of course, report any reply from CNN or information about it being put online.

CNN contact sites here & here for any American reader who may think they should be allowed to see what thais obscenity says.

UPDATE Cincerned Citizen from NJ has put this link in the Comments "All Serbs should be placed in Nazi style concentration Camps" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8UVVZkXV1M It has pictures of the sort of "strong as an ox" sort of person Biden admires & worse of the sort of atrocities he approves of. Very "unhelpful" (even inconvenient) facts, by British media standards.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

All sorts of eminent persons who recognise that windmills while useful for providing support to people who hold correct political views have problems producing power & who do not accept nuclear on the grounds that it is not acceptable, have been looking for a way of making coal power acceptable in a world where burning things produces CO2 the third most dangerous substance in human history.

Their answer is that new coal burning plants should be fitted with, & current ones retrofitted with, carbon capture & storage systems.

The technical problem with storing 150 million tons of CO2 annually, currently released by the UK, under the North Sea for millions of years is that CO2, being a gas under high pressure, might escape & if there was enough of it, catastrophically on a much larger scale than happened in Africa as a result of volcanic action. Such deaths would not be a result of nasty nuclear or other evil profit making actions but of nice government funded ones & while in an overpopulated world some would consider this as good a way as any to get rid of excess population. However since we don't yet have a progressive political system right wing relatives might be able to object. The possibilities of catastrophic escape are increased by the fact that CO2 can turn into carbonic acid.

Fortunately for the environmental community I have found an answer.experiment with algae producing liquid fatsI have previously discussed how algae can turn CO2 into liquid fats. All that is required is that the CO2 from coal, gas & oil plants be pumped into sealed but transparent tubes with high fat producing algae & the effect of photosynthesis will turn this pollution into unlimited quantities of liquid fats which can be pumped at normal pressures back into the places under the North Sea formerly occupied by oilfields. With no pressure & no acidic effect geological experience suggests that these liquid fats can be stored there for as long a period as the oil was. All at a cost & level of reliability significantly greater than wind turbines. With the technical improvements I have suggested to make it sustainable I'm sure this could provide far more than the 10,000 jobs for Scotland & presumably millions worldwide the likes of Mr Salmond have promised.

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Letter sent all of Scotland's & much of the UK's media & as far as I know, not published. Looks like the MSM are as unwilling to publish anything against government "environmentalist" bureaucrats as about fashionable acts of genocide. I did also put this on Gary's Radio Scotland blog & they have not censored it & though not commented on did appear on a separate Google search I made which suggests it has been seen.------------------------------

"I write to let you know of a claim made by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) Feb 2nd on Radio Scotland that radioactivity at Dalgety Bay, could not possibly be natural background radiation because they have tested the particles & proven them to be paint.

After 3 months of a Freedom of Information enquiry by me they have failed to produce any of the requested evidence of any such testing ever taking place or of radiation readings of adjoining beaches ever having been taken for comparison.

On the other hand in the numerous reports they have sent are buried such gems as that the radiation at Dalgety beach, on which they have spent so much money is 1/3rd LESS than experienced every day by anybody in the streets of Aberdeen & that when "attempts were made to disaggregate these samples to pinpoint more accurately the location of the radioactivity. The result showed that .... it was not possible to subdivide the sample further without loss of identity to its constituent parts" which obviously totally contradicts their claim to have separated out the particles, tested them & proven them to be paint & thus manmade. It seems like kicking an argument when it is down to mention that the original radium paint was water soluble so that even if a fraction of a gram had been there 64 years ago it would be long gone, Scotland not having a desert climate.

SEPA are still maintaining this claim to have tested such sub microscopic particles & proven them to be paint containing radium & this must thus be accepted as the highest standard of honesty to which "environmentalists" in the Scottish government aspire. On the other hand either (A) they are telling the truth but for some unfathomable reason they are deliberately concealing the evidence that would support the claim, even though this is a breach of the law, or (B) they are lying.

In any case the fact is that the level of radiation is so much lower than background radiation elsewhere in Scotland. Yet SEPA are allowed to spend probable millions on such pointless nonsense. This, is indicative of the way false fears have been used, worldwide, for bureaucratic eco-empire building. Whether this was intentional or done by people who sincerely believed their own scare stories will be seen by whether (B) or (A) is proven.

It is also worth pointing out that though government bureaucracies worldwide prefer the LNT theory that there is no lower safe limit for radiation they have been unable to produce any actual evidence for it whereas the alternative ^& traditional hormesis theory, that at low levels it is not harmful & even beneficial has substantial evidence behind it. When we consider the at least 10s of trillions of pounds that this false anti-nuclear scare has cost the human race over the last 50 years it is, at the least, unfortunate that such scaremongering has been successful despite the overwhelming scientific evidence.

"I note that the LibDems have announced their campaign for the EU election. This party made a manifesto promise to support a referendum on the new treaty & then, as soon as the election was over, cynically voted against such a referendum. ow could any self respecting person vote for them. I admit I may e biased having been expelled from the party some years ago for being an economic liberal, though I am assured that was just a cover story & I was actually expelled for being against illegal wars & genocide." =========================Herald - Not overly surprised because, looking at the last line, it is clear the Herald's journalists are as much part of Scotland's Luddite political class as the politicians:

"In calling for increased taxpayer "support" for cycling, amounting to what, though he doesn't give costs, looks like over £1 billion a year in Scotland Stuart Allan (letter Saturday) is exercising his basic civil right. Nonetheless it can be argued that this method of locomotion has been around for some time & if it is that great the taxpayer doesn't need to pay himself to do it."=======================To all & sundry - initially written as a reply to a Scotsman letter denouncing the lack of coverage of Sri Lanka compared to Gaza as essentially anti-Semitic bias, which is not untrue. I think the refusal to publish this proves that anti-Semitism is only a small part of the racism our MSM practice:

"Why has there been relatively little coverage of the deaths in Sri lanka when Gaza got front page treatment for weeks?. Perhaps because it is further away or because Britain is in no way involved or because it is difficult for the media to portray it in goodies V baddies terms. However the coverage of both has been infinitely greater than that of the admission, over a year ago, by the chief Yugoslav War Crimes prosecutor, Carla del Ponte, that she & NATO governments had known, for many years, that NATO police (formerly the KLA) had been dissecting hundreds, probably thousands, of innocent people, while they were still alive & selling the body parts to western hospitals. Since this is both closer & far more directly our responsibility than Sri Lanka or indeed Gaza the only remaining reason for it going unreported is that it does not fit the media "goodies & baddies" story with which they & our political leaders sold that illegal war, hospital bombings & subsequent genocide."========================I also sent out letters rewritten from my hormesis & 3rd anniversary of Labour's nuclear "conversion" articles.

UPDATEThis morning I got a phone call from a reporter on the Dundee Courier about my letter. He had contacted SEPA & got a reply that their findings at Dalgety Bay were "consistent with" radium but making no mention of the alleged testing proving it was radium paint. I said those were "weasel words meaning nothing" since it was also consistent with it being purely natural - many things are consistent with many others. He was clearly quite surprised to find that I was simply an ordinary person rather than a representative of some sort of official organisation (other than the 9% Growth Party) & I am sure that had I been a representative of a fakecharity I would have had more responses - I guess they aren't used to individuals making a fuss.

Monday, May 18, 2009

Some time ago I did a poll (still running) on what proportion of the economy people would like to see as government spending. Currently it spends just over 50% which I consider seriously economically damaging. I was quite surprised to see the result so firmly in favour of small government (average being in the 10-19% range) but after all it is neither a large nor a statistically selected sample. Then Mark Wadsworth held a poll with similar results showing 71% wanting government to spend less than 30%> however since he, like I, is fairly libertarian it would not be unreasonable to think his readers might have the same bias. Then David Farrar mentioned this MSM poll:

So actually with 12% in favour of more government spending my readers are more bolshy than the national average of 7%. The other polls were not going for as wide a spread of options as mine but their results do fit were they overlap so I think it right to assume mine are correct across the spread.

The things I find particularly interesting here are (A) that most of the results fit a normal curve whose high point is about 15% (this is taking the 0-10% as representing the whole far side of the curve since the option of government spending less than zero was included, though I'm sure such a thing would be popular) & (B) that those going for the total state solution are not only a small minority but an isolated one. Compromise is often a sensible option but any attempt to placate this minority is not going to satisfy them in any way & will dissatisfy everybody else. For example there are different ways of calculating averages & the mean here (adding each person's choice & dividing) comes to 29% whereas the mode (chosen by most people 0-9%) & median (in the middle of the choices 10-19%) are both much lower. It will be obvious that going for 29% fovernment sector is more than most people want & would do absolutely nothing to satisfy the big state socialists who are not susceptible to the sort of persuasion that the rest of society holds to, else they would fit the normal curve.

It occurs to me that the big statists may only represent 2 or 3 people using more than 1 email, which would explain why they are better represented here than in the imes statistically verified poll, but if so that merely reinforces the argument for ignoring them. This would be the professional political activism of the extreme "left".

I would like to see Reform or some MSM publication or institute like Reform asking this same polling question.

I also think that it would be in the interests of UKIP or the Conservatives to publicly state what % of GNP they wish government to be. Just as it is said that the "left wing" parties can always outbid on promises of more free services it is clear that they could never match any promise to reduce what the state takes.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

We have just passed the 3rd anniversary of Tony Blair reversing Labour policy & calling for more nuclear electricity. on 16th May 2006 he made what was considered a groundbreaking speech to the CBI saying

He was right. Indeed he was massively understating the shortages we face because of the closure of aging plants, the looming closure of about half our coal plants in 2015 when new EU emission rules come into force & massively overstating the possibilities of renewables doing anything useful or indeed of any "step change in energy efficiency". I also think he was overstating any danger from the catastrophic global warming we should all now be suffering from & understandably made no mention of the possibility that a looming recession would halt the increase in demand.

So had a free market been allowed to supply electricity unmolested by the endless bureaucratic delays of government we would just now be seeing new inexpensive electricity (France's is 1/4 of our price) coming on line. We would not be facing massive blackouts in a few years. We would not need a recession to reduce demand & stop minor blackouts. Od course with electricity at 1/4 price we would not see our remaining steel plants closing & would not have a recession - another triumph for the anti-profreess "environmentalists".

I said that Blair's speech was considered to be groundbreaking at the time yet today we seem barely closer to breaking any ground or pouring any concrete. Labour by acknowledging the necessity to act to prevent looming blackouts may have shown themselves slightly more responsible than the SNP & LudDims, whose wilful blindness is inexcusable, but they have also proven how incompetent they are & how destructive the entire edifice of overgovernment is.